Lahore girl who was gang-raped attempts suicide after ‘pressure from prosecution’

LAHORE: A 15-year old rape survivor who was assaulted by at least eight men in a hotel on Mall Road attempted suicide after continuous pressure from police and prosecution, her family said Saturday.

The victim’s brother-in-law told Dawn that the family was about to go to sleep at night when she jumped from the terrace. She injured herself and was rushed to the Services Hospital. She is now back at home recovering.

He said she had been under duress from the police interrogations, where officials harassed her with “all kinds of questions”.

“She’s a child,” her brother-in-law said. “You can imagine what kind of questions they ask.”

The victim’s sister earlier told Dawn that police were pressuring their family to exclude the name of main suspect Adnan from the FIR. She said police started action against the suspects after some TV channels aired the news and appealed to Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and Punjab Chief Minister Shahbaz Sharif for justice.

The teenage girl, an 8th grade student, had earlier said that a PML-N youth wing member and his accomplices kidnapped her from Multan Road and forced her to drink some intoxicated liquid after which she lost consciousness.

This was followed by a text message that was received on the girl’s mother’s mobile phone around 11pm last Friday. The text said: “Your daughter is lying unconscious in room number 230 of a hotel on The Mall.” She said the family found the girl lying unconscious in the hotel room when they reached there along with police.

Racecourse police recovered the girl from the hotel room and shifted her to Services Hospital where reports of initial medical tests revealed she had been assaulted.

On the complaint of the survivor’s mother, the police registered a case against suspects six men and the PML-N member.